Prego
Connection Keeper
Experiential
The Connection Keeper was a custom-designed storytelling device created for Prego and StoryCorps as part of a Mother’s Day campaign centered around family, memory, and shared meals.
Inspired by the iconic gold lid of a Prego sauce jar, the handheld device functioned as an offline, approachable audio recorder designed to live at the dinner table. Families could use it to capture stories, conversations, and memories with parents and loved ones, preserving moments that might otherwise disappear with time.
Smooth Technology designed and developed the complete physical and technical platform for the project, producing a limited run of 100 custom devices.
The Connection Keepers featured:
-Rechargeable battery systems
-More than 10 hours of onboard recording capacity
-Flash-memory-based offline storage
-Simple, highly intuitive controls
-A streamlined upload workflow for sharing recordings
Participants could optionally submit their recordings to StoryCorps, whose archive is affiliated with the Library of Congress. Through the project, personal family stories could become part of a larger historical archive documenting everyday human experience across generations.
A core design principle of the Connection Keeper was intentionality. Unlike always-connected smart devices, the hardware was intentionally designed to function entirely offline and did not include AI functionality or cloud connection capabilities. Nothing was uploaded automatically, monitored in the background, or connected to cloud services by default. Users had complete control over when conversations were recorded and whether they were ever shared.
The result was a physical recorder reminiscent of early digital media: a dedicated device built not for consumption or surveillance, but for listening, storytelling, and preserving memory. By connecting Prego’s longstanding association with family meals to the act of oral history, the project transformed a simple dinner-table interaction into an opportunity for reflection, connection, and cultural preservation.
Press
The whole goal here, Prego and StoryCorps say, is to advocate for keeping people off their phones during dinner.
In a moment when always-on AI wearables are quickly turning into potential privacy violation concerns—it’s actually a refreshing concept.
Millions of hours of conversations just like that could one day sit beside Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath and the actual, literal Declaration of Independence.